Android Activations Top 700K Per Day: Rubin

Google's Android mobile operating system is activated on more than 700,000 handsets, tablets and other devices each day, according Android creator Andy Rubin.

Google (NASDAQ:GOOG) Android has topped
700,000 activations per day, according to the mobile operating system's chief
architect Andy Rubin.
Rubin, Google's Google senior vice
president of mobile, made the announcement via Twitter and on Google+, adding: "and for those wondering,
we count each device only once (ie, we don't count re-sold devices), and 'activations'
means you go into a store, buy a device, put it on the network by subscribing
to a wireless service."

That latter detail, taken as truth,
should settle the argument about whether Google is fudging its numbers for
Android activations. Any way one slices it, 700,000 is a huge number.

As 9-to-5 Google
noted, that's almost 5 million every week, 21 million a month, or over 250
million Android devices activated a year. For market perspective, Apple sold 4
million iPhone 4S units in its first week in October, and 17 million total
iPhones in the third quarter.
Clearly, the holiday selling season has
been a boon for Android. Consider that Google just reported 550,000 activations
in only November, up from 500,000 in June and 400,000 in May for Google I/O.
It's likely handsets such as Motorola
Mobility's (NYSE:MMI) Droid Razr and Samsung's Galaxy Nexus on Verizon Wireless'
4G LTE (Long Term Evolution) network, along with Samsung Galaxy S II handsets
from AT&T (NYSE:T), Sprint (NYSE:S) and T-Mobile, are selling well.
Appitalism CEO Simon Buckingham told
AllThingsDigital that daily Android activations could reach 2.5 million per day, or more than 900
million units a year. His argument is that there is plenty of momentum behind
the OS.
It's also reaching more markets
worldwide on low-cost handsets and appearing in other devices, including
tablets and Google TV-based televisions. Through November Android's smartphone market share is roughly 53 percent in
the United States and 50 percent worldwide.